The present invention relates to an adapter for use in connection with combined coolers and dispensers for liquids, particularly water.
In the later years a number of offices, private and public institutions, hotels, ships etc. have installed combined coolers and dispensers for drinking water and for other types of drinks. One kind of such combined coolers and dispensers comprises a unit where a rather large bottle-shaped container is placed bottom up on the top of the combine cooler and dispenser. The bottle-shaped container has a standardized shape and a volume of 5 gallons (18.9 liters). The upper part of the combined cooler and dispenser unit has a downwardly extending top surface with an opening in its centre with a shape corresponding to the outer bottleneck part of the bottle-shaped standardized container. When the container is placed on the top of the combined cooler and dispenser unit, the container is thus supported by the top surface of the combined cooler and dispenser. In the outlet of the container there is arranged a valve which automatically opens when the container is placed bottom-up on the top of the combined cooler and dispenser. When the valve in the outlet opening of the container is in open position, the inner volume of the container will communicate with a reservoir in the cooling unit and with the dispensing unit where water can be tapped into drinking cups or the like.
When using the above mentioned standardized bottle-shaped container, water tapped from the container has to be substituted by air. Air is supplied to the container as water is being tapped from the dispensing unit. It has, however, been found that by using this kind of container, the air supplied to the container may contain bacteria and as the container which its content is normally kept at room temperature, the bacteria which enters the container may multiply in number and may give rise to infections when drinking the water. Further, the use of bottle-shaped containers are not very efficient for transport and storage, as such containers occupy far more space than for instance brick-shaped containers.
It an object of the present invention to provide an adapter for use in connection with the above described combined cooling and dispensing units, which will allow use of other kinds of containers than the standardized bottle-shaped containers described above. It is further an object of the present invention to provide an adapter which allows the use of containers where supply of air to the container is not needed.
Accordingly the present invention relates to an adapter for use in connection with combined coolers and dispensers for liquids, particularly drinking water, which coolers and dispensers are intended for receiving a bottle-shaped container placed bottom-up on the top of the combined cooler and dispenser, said adapter comprising a support for supporting a container for a liquid, a chamber extending downwardly from the support, said chamber having an opening in its wall, a lower part intended to be supported by the combined cooler and dispensing unit, a vertical pipe arranged in the bottom part which pipe is closed at its upper end and is closable or open at its lower end, and on its upper part has a flange which is open towards the inside of the pipe, said flange being intended to be connected to a flexible hose connecting the pipe to a container intended to be placed in the support of the adapter and where the lower part of the vertical pipe is intended to communicate with a reservoir and with the to the pipe system in the combined cooler and dispenser.
The support of the adapter can have many different shapes and can be made to receive containers of different shapes and sizes. It is, however, preferred that the support has a rectangular or square cross-section.
The adapter according to the present invention is particularly useful for containers comprising a reasonable stiff outer container having an inner flexible container made from soft plastic such that the inner container collapses as liquid is tapped from the container. The adapter according to the present invention can further be used for containers having its outlet opening in the bottom of the container.
According to a preferred embodiment of the adapter according to the present invention the vertical pipe is rigidly affixed to the bottom of the lower part of the adapter, and the lower part of the vertical pipe is in this embodiment equipped with a valve which by means of a floating disk arranged in the reservoir of the combined cooler and dispenser, is intended to close the outlet opening of the vertical pipe when the reservoir is filled with water and to open when water is being tapped from the reservoir.
According to another embodiment of the adapter according to the present invention the vertical pipe is arranged vertically movable in the bottom part of the lower part of the adapter and where the vertical pipe is intended to be moved downwardly in vertical direction in order to connect the vertical pipe to the pipe system in the combined cooler and dispenser.
The adapter according to the present invention is preferably affixed to the combined cooling and dispenser by means of a mechanical fastening means such as a screw connection or the like in order to make sure that the adapter can not move in relation to the combined cooler and dispenser.
By the use of the adapter according to the present invention, the adapter is placed on the top of the combined cooler and dispenser. Thereafter a container is placed in the support of the adapter. A flexible hose which is connected to the bottom of the container is thereafter connected to the flange of the pipe arranged in the lower part of the adapter. The opening in the sidewall of the chamber below the support of the adapter makes space for manual connection of the hose to the flange. For an adapter according to the preferred embodiment of the invention, the valve in the bottom of the vertical pipe will now be in open position and water can flow from the container to the reservoir in the combined cooler and dispenser until the floating disk arranged in the reservoir closes the valve. Further water will thereafter only flow from the container to the reservoir when water is being tapped form the combined cooler and dispenser.
For an adapter according to the second embodiment of the invention, the vertical movable pipe is pressed downwards until connection is obtained between the pipe and the pipe system in the combined cooler and dispenser thereby allowing flow of water from the container to the cooler unit and further to the dispensing unit in the combined cooler and dispenser.
As water is being tapped from the dispenser, the flexible inner container placed inside the stiff container will collapse. Return air can thus not pass into the inner flexible container and the possibility of transport of bacteria to the water in the container has been eliminated. When the inner container has been emptied, the flexible hose is disconnected from the flange of the vertical pipe and the empty container can be removed from the support of the adapter and a new container can be installed.
In addition to eliminating supply of bacteria to the water, the adapter according to the present invention makes it possible to use containers regardless of the shape of the container, such as for instance prism-shaped containers or cube-shaped containers. Containers having such a shape are much more efficient to transport and to store than conventional bottle-shaped container as they require less space for the same container volume.